


A Shootout at High Daddio (Let's Play 6 Questions)

by friendlytroll



Series: A Drink With Zenigata [4]
Category: Lupin III
Genre: Flirting, Heavy flirting, Kissing, M/M, Rival Relationship, Romance, Shooting Guns, Smoking, ghengis khan romance, jigen being chaotic gay, red jacket era
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-07-12 12:23:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15995150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/friendlytroll/pseuds/friendlytroll
Summary: "I received a strange invitation- it seems I'm being given a chance to steal the Star’s Child Sapphire on a silver platter! There's just one catch... I can't bring a single person with me! Sorry, Jigen, I guess you'll have to wait this one out. But- Ara? Pops is there too...? Wait a second, playing without me isn't any fair! Next time... 'A Shootout At High Daddio!' See Ya!"While cooling his heels waiting while Lupin is somewhere he can't follow, Zenigata bides his time with a little target practice. Jigen runs across him by chance, and decides to use the opportunity to satisfy his own curiosity. But what's an afternoon with pops if he doesn't get a chance to tease the man, anyhow...? A friendly game of shootout might wind up being a little more then Zenigata was ready to handle.





	1. Jigen's Proposition

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place in the Red Jacket era, somewhere after "Wings of Death, Albatross". The events of "Alter Ego Maniac" and "Lion, Cheatin', and Stealin' are also alluded to. Zenigata's backstory details which will come up in chapter 2 are purely of my own creation.  
> Has Lupin/Zenigata, and Jigen/Lupin at minimum in the background, but since Lupin only shows up later in a flashback so far, it'd seem mean to tag as such  
> Chapter 2 shouldn't take long, since the bulks already written, so I hope you enjoy~!

Sometimes people asked Zenigata questions about what chasing Lupin was like. Not what the man himself was like, he got questions about that nearly constantly if he lets people ask. Requests to talk to the press for things like that- hah! He’d gotten over the idea anything remotely useful could come out of _that_ even before Lupin had vanished for five years. 

But sometimes people asked about the chase. He didn’t mind that so much. But people did seem to think it was going to sound like some rollicking adventure. And true. He tells himself often that he’s just a man of the law following his duty; he was striving for a goal, not playing about with some game. So saying something like he _enjoyed_ it was… off. Surely it wasn’t right if he did. 

But…there had been a few times now, where he’d found himself stumbling off of the merry go round that was Lupin the Third. And each time, without fail, he’d found himself restless. Every other criminal was so cheap and crude. So… _dull._ Whatever else this hunt was in his life, it was only rarely dull.

Rarely. Not _never_. 

That’s the hard part to… _one_ of the hard parts to explain. That sometimes, just every once in a while, it can be so damn boring he could scream. Mostly, Lupin went, and he would race to get ahead of him. Any second not on the move was a moment he could spend scouring for clues to what his next target could be. And that’s the problem.

He can’t use up his energy on figuring out where Lupin is. He _knows_ where he is. He just can’t do a single damn thing about it. 

Zenigata hasn’t learned yet how to handle these times. Maybe someday in the future, he could take this kind of thing calmly. But watching a flash of red jacket and a stupid smile vanish behind a wall he can’t pass… it ground on his last nerve. 

The country they were in was one of those places he can never quite keep track of. Europe, lots of oddly specific army uniforms and oak trees. Highlighted target of interest, the Star’s Child; Blue sapphire with unique pattern of flaws that appears to resemble the night sky, with accompanying legend. Unique, romantic name, possible lead to further, larger treasure…

It would have been a perfect storm of Lupin the Third Bait even if it WASN’T in the possession of a suspiciously reclusive local ruler. Who lives in a castle. And dresseslike a parrot deciding to attend the opera. He probably could have saved himself the trouble and just set a net in front of the border. The lupin shaped hole punched through it would have been all the warning he needs. 

But… that was the problem. The ICPO wasn’t wanted there. A chilly reception had been the least of it- they’d been stopped dead at the borders. Trying to sneak in was out of the question- the castle’s defenses were absolutely lethal. Spikes, pits, snares, gunfire, alligators, some kind of trained hawk, fire, henchmen with extremely literal noun-name themes…it was a nightmare. He’d have been the first to say a really genuinely tough security system needs failsafes, but at some point it gives him the same worried concern as watching a child pick out their own ice cream toppings. 

Nobody who lives in a castle and doesn’t want the police around was ever up to anything good. Still, he’s confident that there would be some opening he could find, somewhere. So long as he can wait for that moment, he could expose whatever stupidly nefarious plan was going on, and snatch Lupin up in the process when he least expects it. And.. call someone to make sure those poor damn alligators went to a safe habitat. 

But for now… his hands are tied. And he has to rely on the only thing that ever seems to help at these times. Keeping himself busy. 

He’d found this little ghost town while searching for a way to monitor the situation from a safe distance. It was hidden at end of a bumpy little road that wasn’t even marked on new maps. Maybe about twenty buildings all together, he reckons. A few stores. Some personal homes. The forest had moved in when the people had left, and vines had consumed whatever time hadn’t eaten away. Really only one, maybe two buildings still had so much as a roof still on them.

It was a peaceful place. Plenty of time to think.

It was just that’s the last thing he wanted. 

Zenigata’s hands move on automatic as he squares his stance. Check ammo, check safety, finger above the trigger. He’d set up his ‘target range’ inside one of the half collapsed buildings, marking spots with a paint marker on the grey, dried out wood at regular intervals. At closest was about the distance of a cars length, small marks. Furthest away was the very end of the building’s half collapsed, where even the hand-radius sized marks he’d made were difficult to see among the foliage and shadows. 

He closes his eyes, and waits; the wind catching his jacket is his cue. 

Sight target, confirm, _fire_. Move, sight, fire. He groups his shots- close got one shot each, far counting off, reload in a single action of removing the old and clicking the new in place. _Move and fire_. Count each shot. Keep moving to reload. Repeat.

When he stops, panting raggedly, he looks over his results. All close targets were punched right through- some so cleanly he couldn’t see the marker. His far away targets all at a glance were marked through with a few shots each, forming a neat pen-stroke of fire running across the top or side of each circle. He huffs, satisfied, and performs his cool-down. Check gun, eject clip, hit the safety on, take out earplugs…

The clapping wasn’t loud; just a soft, appreciative little noise. Gunpowder had surrounded him while he fired, but now it cleared slowly as the wind shifts again. Menthol. 

“Oy, Pops. If you wanted to work on your aim, I’m a little offended you never asked.” 

Zenigata turns, his hackles up. Jigen Daisuke stands leaning- _lounging-_ against the remains of an old streetlamp, somehow managing to look completely at home there. Judging from the cigarette butt already littering the ground, he must have been there for at least five minutes.

It strikes Zenigata, not for the first time, that it takes real skill to be that rumpled. From his hat, his cigarette, his suits, and his morals he was rumpled through and through. The only things about him that ever seemed sleek and sharp to Zenigata were his gun, his aim and his eyes. Whenever he got a glimpse of them, anyway

Jigen pushes off the lamp post, ambling in his direction and making Zenigata draw himself up.  
“I don’t know _how you found me_ Jigen but-“ he’s cut off by, of all things, the gunman patting his cheek, quieting him with a shock that felt like it starts from his cheek and passes over him in a wave. 

“Easy tiger. Total coincidence. I was just out here on an innocent walk, and imagine my surprise when I hear the gun of ICPO finest.” Jigen keeps walking past the frozen officer, striding out to one of the bullet ridden targets to look it over. 

For all Jigen knew it really was a coincidence he’d wound up where the cop was- he’d just followed Lupin’s directions for the best place to watch the castle from a distance. The duke (earl?) had literally invited Lupin in, but only if he went alone. And his partner wanted to play along with the baron’s game. So- him and Zenigata maybe just wound up in the same place for the same reason.

But who knows with Lupin sometimes. Maybe he just wanted someone watching Jigen’s back… or Jigen watching Zenigata’s. Lupin could get pretty damn sentimental about his steady foe. 

Maybe Lady Luck had just decided to play a little game with them. Either way he doesn’t mind too much. It wasn’t like Jigen wanted to see something bad happen to the guy himself. And he’d been bored. 

It was worth it just for getting to see Zenigata working on his aim. _Precise_ wasn’t a word he’d use to describe Zenigata… and it still wasn’t. It hadn’t been precise shooting- not exactly. Accurate, he gives him that. His eyes were obviously fast. But his hands couldn’t seem to keep up. His head would snap into position, way ahead of when he brought his sights up properly Jigen could see clear as day how he was furiously pushing his arms and hands to the limit to try and bridge that delay. 

But Jigen didn’t quite get something about what he was doing. That was interesting. Interesting enough to actually examine his results, just to double check the suspicion beginning to stir in him.

“You found me by _the sound of my gun?_ ” Zenigata presses, suspicon flared high enough to jump on the detail.

“Of course. I _never_ forget a pistol I’ve handled before.” Jigen’s eyes crinkle unseen as he smiles- watching Zenigata’s goofy cunning suspicion roll over into an embarassed, angry fluster. What he’d said was true, though. Shame he’d only ever had reason to snag his gun more then the once- it was a beaut. 

Zenigata’s piece was a classic colt- the M1911. A gun that goes with a lawman like drops of water and whiskey. It’d sunk heavy reassurance into his hands, with barely a whisper of recoil even as it fired rounds that’d kick clear through to your shoulder on most guns. It’d clearly been maintained with care, too. 

He could just imagine it. Zenigata at the end of his day, diligently tending to a gun that barely ever made it out of his holster. 

Oh and the colt, too. 

Zenigata buries his embarrassment under a fresh wave of annoyance the best he can- this is no time to be losing his edge. And Jigen smiling worries him- _that_ expression always seemed to hit just before Zenigata ran face first into a wall he hadn’t seen. Sometimes literally. He’s already on edge, and if there’s one person who can wind him up as easily as Lupin… 

“…Lupin? He knows I’m here, doesn’t he!” It wouldn’t be the first time Lupin had figured him out and decided to play some idiot game with him. 

Jigen stop to glance back at him, rolling the question over in his mind. His mind was only half on the conversation, he’d moved from the close targets- back for the others, visually checking the positions. 

“Who knows.” Winds up being his only answer, making Zenigata sag with annoyed exhaustion. Jigens hand comes up to idly trace a bullet hole.

“You know you could at least seem a little worried.” Zenigata mutters, watching Jigen carefully. 

“Lupin can take care of himself.” Jigen spits his cigarette out as it hits the end, grinding it under his heel. Immediately he pulls out a fresh smoke, gesturing to Zenigata with it. He’s still staring at the targets, trying to put together what was bugging him.

“I meant about me!” Zenigata corrects him. Despite himself, Zenigata takes out his lighter and tosses it to him, watching Jigen snatch it out of the air without even a glance. 

Still. He hadn’t… really considered Jigen WOULD be worried. Him and Lupin had been inseparable as soon as Jigen had ever showed up. They worked so smoothly together it was genuinely unnerving. He’d seen countless dumb little plans and maneuvers pulled off without more then a shared glance between them. If Lupin had any kind of plan, Zenigata was sure Jigen always knew it. 

“Sorry pops. Promise, I’d be quaking in my shoes any other day.” Jigen drawled, lighting up and tossing the lighter back towards him. Zenigata tries to catch it with an angry swipe that misses and knocks the lighter higher up into the air. He fumbles again while it’s sailing past on the way down, resulting in him briefly juggle the lighter from hand to hand.

“If you could do anything, you’d have clapped cuffs on me already. Hell, lets be honest, you’d be in there interrupting Lupin’s little dance with the Earl.” Jigen jabs his thumb int he direction of the distant castle

“The Królewicz.” Zenigata corrects, finally managing to shove his lighter in a pocket. Damn and hell, he hates it but the man was half right. Oh, he would have _loved_ to take Jigen in…but he’d have to drag him all the way to the border to be able to arrest him. That’d leave lupin free to get away and spring his partner at his leisure. 

“Right, like I said. Count Chocula.” Jigen says, grinning from seeing Zenigata have to restrain an obvious snicker. He takes a deep drag on his cigarette, smile fading as he thinks. 

“Honestly Pops, I kinda wish you _were i_ n there.” He says, and means it. He leans back against a bullet riddled wall, looking at the man thoughtfully.

The reason he’d wanted to check the marks was because they’d been strange. On a person, the marker circles wound up somewhere a little higher then your hips, or way up on the shoulder lines. It completely ignored the standard Head-and-Chest marks almost any gun training would be done with. But now he was sure he knows. 

They were hands. The low marks were exactly around where someones hands would be in the middle of drawing a gun, and the high marks around where most people would be taking aim down the sights. Thats why his shots were all grouped on the edges.

He was aiming for a gun held in someone’s hands. 

Jigen was pretty sure he could count on his fingers how many times he’d ever seen Zenigata actually _draw_ his colt, let alone with what Jigen would call genuine intent to fire on the group. And even then, most of those times had been pretty early on. Ropes, handcuffs, that fancy metal baton of his… he’d seen those all a hundred times. The gun? Not often.

But it wasn’t never. And that’s what set him to thinking, more and more these days. Because ONE of those times had been the day he’d had to learn all over again Zenigata could be a threat. Jigen can still remember the feeling of his gun yanked out of his hand by exactly the kind of shot he was practicing now. The shock alone had felt like a sudden plunge into an ice bath. 

It was enough to make a man ask himself… Just how much was Zenigata like Lupin? 

Maybe all they had in common was being guys who never took a break or let something go. But if it was more then that… then Jigen had to think about just how many times he’d seen people get bowled over by Lupin because they decided his boss was nothing more then a clown. 

He has to think about just how easy it was to think of a trained ICPO officer as just goofy ol’ too good for his own good Pops, instead of as an enemy. He was their favorite fly in the ointment; a challenge they could only ever half plan for. Sometimes it even kinda felt like a friendly game. But there’d always be that part of Jigen that keeps it’s neat little tallies, and the math it keeps handing back on Zenigata only adds up to one thing. 

He’s dangerous. 

Jigen’s life had been full of dangerous men. Out of all of those, there’d been maybe a dozen Jigen had found himself wanting to keep around at some point or another. And the ones who’d ever actually really stayed? That he can count on one hand. Three by his side, and one… 

And only one man who had stepped fearlessly in front of Jigen’s sights a hundred times, and never seemed to show a lick of fear about it. Who had shoved him out the way of a rain of bullets. 

One threat who, when push had ever come to shove, and Zenigata’s life had been on the line it’d never even been a question that they’d save him. He couldn’t pretend it was Lupin’s sentimentality either. At least once, _he’d_ been who pushed Lupin not to leave it to the last second. Some things you just didn’t gamble with. 

But if it isn’t even a question for Jigen that pops was worth more then a take, and Zenigata never hesitates to act like Jigen was worth more then a collar… what the hell did you call that?

Jigen could get by just find with an _enemy_ he didn’t get. It even suits him find to not really understand a friend. But if he finds himself actually respecting someone? Then he needs to _know_. 

The gang he understands. 

Lupin was a man who escaped from the silver screen to wow the world. A runaway engine of energy and ideas and excitement. A demon who’d come back at someone with twice whatever he’d been dealt. A softie who would stop on a dime to suddenly become some poor kids fairytale knight

He’s the guy who, far away from the crowds and newspapers he loves to delight, works harder then anyone could ever know. Because he didn’t want the world to know that he has to work for what he does, but lets a suspicious old assasin in behind the camera to see how the magic works. 

Goemon was wildflowers and green bursting through stone ruins. 

When he’d first met Goemon, it was like someone crammed a house fire of anger and bloodlust down under someone’s skin and locked it up tight. Over the years, he’d watches as Goemon slowly banked his fire into glowing coals, and learned how to pick his own locks. Every smile, every sarcastic snipe, or evening of letting himself relax- every minute of that was something Goemon had to fight himself for. Inch by inch, year by year.

The guy who’d sneered about guns, and now would watch him clean his magnum with fascinated eyes no matter how many times he’d seen it. The guy who’d sworn to take Lupins life, and teases the guy in little calm jabs while stealing food off his plate. Someone who’d learned late in life that he was a natural at laughter. 

Fujiko…

He doesn’t trust Fujiko. He can almost consider himself friends with Fujiko. He’s worked with her hundreds of times. She’s good company, in a ‘watch your wallet’ kind of way. Somewhere along the line she’d become a pal of a kind. Someone to have a brandy with and talk borderline gossip about the criminal world. Not to mention ganging up with her to mess with Lupin is a great time. 

She’s a piano performance over violence. A beautiful shadow. Trouble; sometimes the fun kind. But he trusts her to be good at what she does, and nothing more. It’s nothing personal… sort of. Sometimes a man could get fed up.

That just leaves the one gap. He makes his mind up. He’s no slick talker, but neither was Zenigata by any stretch of the imagination. Besides, Pops was a kind of man Jigen knows his way around just fine. The kind with a big laugh, a loud voice, and fire in their veins. Maybe a little more between the shoulders then between the ears. He could get into some real trouble with guys like that. 

If, admittedly, not more trouble then leggy too smart for their own good boys with the devils smile. 

_“_ But while I got you out here… what do you say we have a little fun? Till our favorite idiots done with his scavenger hunt, at least” Jigen asks, tapping ash out onto the grass.

“Sorry, ‘have a little fun’…?” Zenigata growls cautiously, clearing his throat and trying to banish the rising heat from his cheeks.

“Play around a bit.” Jigen starts to walk towards him. He can see Zenigata stiffen, but he won’t back down- no, he’s too tough for that. Poor bastard.

“I… I mean, L-Lupin is…” Zenigata freezes up when Jigen stops in front of him, gaining a sudden total interest in the foliage above them. 

“ _Lupin’s_ busy, pops. Leaving us both out here on our lonesomes. Hell, he’d probably be thrilled if we kept each other company…” Which was probably - no - _definitely_ true. Though he’d be pouty as hell if he missed any fun. 

“So, how about it?” Jigen tilts his head, one eye peeking out from under his hat’s shadow as he watches Zenigata tie himself up into knots. 

“What… what would… that uh….?” Zenigata pokes his index fingers together, his pulse skyrocketing. Jigen was so close that every lazy exhale of breath sent smoke rolling up Zenigata’s chest.

“…be?” Zenigata manages to finish. 

“Oh, just a little shoot off.”

“I- _what_.” 

Zenigata looks back down, and immediately regrets it. If he hadn’t looked down, he could have decided Jigen was just picking his words badly and he was misreading something in his frazzled state. But now he had to look dead into that gigantic crooked grin, and immediately confront that he was being messed with. 

“Damn it, I’m leaving.” Zenigata turns to stride back out, almost pitching backwards when Jigen grabbed the back of his coat. He has to wheel his arms to keep his balance, stuck with one leg in the air before he manages to forcefully right himself. He takes a slow step forward with a growl, embarassed determination driving him. Jigen was still calmly smoking as he keeps his grip- leaning back so his heels dig into the ground without any real effort on his part. 

“Cmon, I’m bored, and you’re a good enough shot to make it interesting. …I can make it worth your while.”

“Absolutely not.”

“You sure? With your salary I could consider any losses a charity donation.” 

Zenigata took a break from slowly creating two jigens-shoe-wide trenches in the ground to quietly rest his forehead against the nearest wall. Behind him, he can just hear the sound of Jigen blowing smoke. 

“How about information?” That seems to get Zenigata’s attention. He sees a baleful eye peek his way… giving him the delightful feeling of watching motion in the water just as you cast your hook. 

“Information? What about.” Zenigata asks cautiously. 

“Playing coy doesn’t suit you, Pops. Lupin, of course.” The sweet thing about Zenigata is no matter how many times he got fooled, it never seemed to keep his hopes from rising the exact same way. Such an honest guy. Pity about the company he keeps. 

“And what do you get out of it?” Zenigata turns around to face him, leaning his back firmly against the wall. 

“Information for information- yours about Lupin and mine about you.” 

“Me?” Zenigata tilts his head, caught off guard. If that was a trap, it was pretty hard to see how… 

“Color me curious.” Jigen gives a wide armed shrug, tilting his head slightly in the gesture.

Zenigata turns it over in his head a little. Not being able to see his angle is worrying, but… information from a source like this might be once in a lifetime.

“We take turns picking each other’s shots. Every target you hit, I’ll tell you something about Lupin. Every target I hit, you tell me something back. Nice and fair” Jigen watches the gears turn in the other mans head, as Zenigata’s arms cross over his chest like he’s trying to hold up a wall. 

“So no questions.” Zenigata regards Jigen intently, for all the good it does him. Trying to read Jigen was as much use as grey print on black paper. No matter how much it was all there to see, he didn’t know the trick to make it worthwhile

“It’s a friendly game, not me offering to rat out my partner.” He waits, patiently as Zenigata seems to quietly mull it over. He knows he’ll get his answer when he sees Zenigata draw himself back up. 

“You and I both know you’ll get more out of this then I can. I could train for the rest of my life just to lose to you.” 

It’s that real squared shoulder thing he does, sometimes. Where he stands up straight and looks a little more like his suits actually fit. When he fixes you with a firm gaze like that… it could almost make a guy ashamed to be such a bad man. 

Almost.

“How about this. If either of us misses a shot, then you have to answer a question.” He grins and holds out his hand as if to shake on it… and immediately got a shock. 

“ _Done._ ” Zenigata grins, grabbing Jigens outstretched hand to shake before he can rethink the terms.

“Gee, Pops… _You that sure I’ll miss, huh?_ ” Jigen firmly increases his grip until he can hear a joint crack, grin going serrated as Zenigata’s eyes widen.

“Not… at… all-“ Zenigata exhales with relief as Jigen lets go and shakes his hand out.

“I know better then anyone that this is a thousand to one chance. I just don’t care…” Zenigata recovers and beams with determined pride, thumping his fist against his own chest pridefully. 

“Because I… am a man who’ll charge in a thousand times!” 

Jigen stares at him a second, blinking- the ash on his cigarette slowly falling to the ground. Slowly, a snicker rolls out of him, shoulders shaking. It was just too sincere for him to take, and he has to slap a hand to his forehead as he helplessly guffaws.

A second later, Zenigata is stalking back towards his car, hands shoved deep in his coat pockets and slouching forward, shoulders pulled up tight around his ears. The trail of smoke his fury left in the air was joined by Jigen’s cigarette smoke, the gunman once again pulled along right behind him, one hand holding tight to the tail of his trench coat. The other he has to keep clapped tight over his hat to keep it from flying away- with how mad Pops was it was as good as a jet ski.

“Now, now pops…”  
  
“LET GO.”  
  
“We already shook on it, Pops.”

Zenigata’s pace slows at that, a low whining grumble working its way out of him like a dog pretending it hasn’t heard an order.   
  
Jigen stands back up on his two feet as Zenigata finally stops, and with a flicker of curiosity lifts up the back of Zenigata’s trench coat, half bending over to get a decent peek at the lining.

…Of course the low wolf whistle was just for fun. Jigen springs back out of the way of Zenigata whirling on him with a roar, bouncing backwards on his heels. He turns and ducks neatly out of the way of a flying pair of handcuffs, diving forward to scramble up one of the overgrown lamp posts. 

Zenigata slams against the bottom of it, growling at the smug black cat of a man now perched completely out of his reach. Jigen was sitting on it like a bar stool, one leg crossed comfortably over the other. _God damn mafia son of a_ -

“Down boy, down!” Jigen whistled suddenly, gesturing down at the ground with two fingers.

There was a soft thump of Zenigata hitting the ground, before he stops, blinks, and immediately springs back up to his feet, trying to leap for Jigen with a roar. 

“Cmon pops. I was just curious where you kept all those cuffs.” Jigen calmly lifts his legs up out of the way as Zenigata leaps, holding onto the lamp post with one hand as Zenigata gets a grip only to slowly slides back down the metal pole to the ground. 

“ _Jigen absolutely-not-your-real-name Daisuke I am going to shake you down from there like the ROTTEN APPLE YOU ARE!”_ Zenigata springs back up to his feet, seeing red. 

“I’ll have you know I have multiple forms of ID and a birth certificate that say otherwise.” Jigen calmly blows a ring of smoke, leaning down a bit to look at him.

“Careful taking it out, In case the INKS STILL WET.” A pair of handcuffs went swinging through the air, but it was a pretty wild throw- Jigen swung himself to the side, watching with interest as a nearby tree found its self under arrest. 

“Don’t let Lupin hear you make a joke like that He’d be real sore that you think he’d make such a rookie mistake.” He retorted, righting himself. Hmm. Mighta overdone it-Pops was in a big enough fit maybe he’d call it off, handshake or no. But as he watches curiously, Zenigata just stalked off towards one of the half collapsed buildings instead of to his car. 

Zenigata draws himself up slowly- forcing his shoulders down, and his chest out- fixing on the wall and balling up his fists… before, just BARELY, thinking better of it. Instead he raises up one boot, inhales- 

Hold the breath.

-And slams his foot forward into the wall as hard as he possibly can. For a moment it almost seems not to have done anything, until with a resounding chorus of splintering, the wall slowly cracks under his foot- the crack traveling out accross the wall until it slowly pitches backwards, hitting the ground with a resounding thud. 

Zenigata lets out a slow, long sigh of satisfaction, posture slouching forward again. Annoyance still bubbles through him, but much closer to his usual low simmer. He turns back to Jigen, scratching the back of his head a bit as he looks to jigen. 

“All right, now I’ll be able to aim properly. You can come down.” He calls up, taking out a cigarette of his own to light, inhaling deeply to try and sand off a little more of the stress. Weird. Had Jigen’s hair been that puffy before…? Must have been the humidity. 

“You know what I might stay up here.” Jigen retorts, firmly tugging the brim of his hat back down over his hair. Jesus Mary and Joseph. It’s not like he hadn’t seen the big guy do something like that before, and the wall was pretty rotten but- wait. 

“…Aim? We still on?” Jigen perks up at that- hopping off and landing on his feet with light ease, the startle (almost) totally forgotten with his glee. 

“I’m a man of my word.” Zenigata says, looking away with a scowl. It was true… but. Also… if the price for new information on Lupin was Zenigata’s pride? He usually paid out plenty of that for _free_. 

“Yeah, but that’s all right Pops. We all got bad habits.” 


	2. First Three Shots

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the first three shots of the shootout, and the heat is on. There's no such thing as an even match where Jigen is concerned, but he might be getting more out of this bargain then even he would have guessed. Features an actual appearance from Lupin himself, if only in the form of a flashback.  
> They'll get around to that drink eventually...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter briefly references episode 54 of Series 2, "Detective Hanshichi - The Tenth-Year Engagement”.   
> Zenigata's backstory is purely my own invention, and information about Lupin is a mix of mine, and my pal Grizzs' ideas. Him being a bad singer is just cannon, source: any time he has ever sung.

Jigen looks around them, ignoring a fresh glare from Pops. He contemplates options for their little ‘duel’, watching Pops prep his colt. The careful way he went through the nice proper procedure with his gun wasn’t bad to watch. 

“OK, Pops, how’s about this. Round of six shots. We each take a shot, then we trade info. Nice and clean. Flip you for first.” Jigen smoothly pulls out his magnum, doing no more to check its ammo then check the weight in his hands. 

They’d wound up out in the abandoned street again, all mossy cobblestones and heavy piled leaves. The sun was only just starting to lower from the sky, lengthening the shadows on the overgrown little town. He’d spotted Pops’ car, it was tucked away on one side of he road, pulled in between two buildings and under a tree. Not a bad hiding job… he supposes Zenigata did spend a lot of time on ambushes. 

A quick glance in the car seemed to indicate he was willing to wait a while, too- he could see camping gear in the back. So that made two guys who were looking at a chilly nights worth of joint aches over Lupin’s dumb plans. Three, if he wasn’t politely pretending to ignore how Goemon’s hands never really recovered some of the damage they’d gone through. 

“Not even if we used one of my coins. I’ll take first.” Zenigata ignores Jigen snickering at his suspicion, glancing out at the castle still in view. Jigen didn’t seem too concerned with keeping an eye on it. That leaves him with a few clean options. Either he was waiting for a specific time, knew it’d be a while, or Lupin’s signal to him wouldn’t be something you could easily miss.

“Suit yourself.” Jigen gives a calm look up over the area, eyes flicking over options. He wants to see what the guy can do… no point going too easy on him.

“4 o clock, weathervane still left up on the roof- Gimme a clean shot to the tail.”

Zenigata nods in response, turning to his right and scanning the environment… before cursing softly under his breath. There was a weathervane all right; a nice flat rooster that had to be half rust. And yet, you had to salute the craftsman, they’d made it finely enough it still functioned. The proof of THAT was it cheerfully lurching and spinning as the wind changes… spinning the tail directly away from him. 

“…smart alek punk.” he growls. 

“Flattery ain’t gettin you out of the shot, pops.” Jigen lets his magnum rest at his side while he watches, one hand on his hips. 

Zenigata lets outshort huffs, and trains his gun on the weathervane- closing his eyes a second to wait for the wind to come up. As soon as he senses the shift he fires- opening his eyes a split second later to watch as the twisting weathervane is sent into a spin as it’s hit. He’s unable to keep from pridefully smirking a single metal tail feather bounces free over the tiles- confidence rising. He turns to Jigen, and grins as he gets back an approving nod. 

But… arguably now he was at the hard part. He quickly goes over everything he’d seen in the town when he was scouting it earlier. Was anything tricky enough for the world’s greatest marksman? Maybe he could try something a LITTLE unfair. 

“On your six. The store inside still has a can on it’s shelves. You should be able to see it through the window.“ Zenigata lets himself indulge in a prideful sneer as Jigen nonchantly turned around, watching him adjust his hat. 

Fine, he WAS an unbeatable marksman- but there was no such thing as a truly inevitable loss. If Zenigata could bring any edge to the fight now, it has to be with his own strengths. He was willing to stake anything on his sense of observation, and memory. Even if Jigen could HIT the target… he can make it as annoying as possible! Let his opponent taste the pettiness of a man with almost no pride left. 

Jigen looks side to side, turns once on his heel, and the magnum rings out; as Zenigata stares at him he can _just_ make out the motion of Jigen’s shot threading through a thin break in the glass that had _already been there_ , producing no sound but a sharp metallic puncture.

Zenigata almost doesn’t need to confirm it, but does anyway: jogging lightly to the store and glancing inside to see the can laying on the floor, lid blown cleanly off. When he gets back to the gunman the sheer overwhelming smugness is tangible in the air, like heat from a fire. And ehen Jigen gestures with his unlit cigarette he pulls his lighter out once again, holding it up for him. 

“I’m afraid of heights.” Zenigata mutters, petulant. That much he has to assume he wouldn’t know. 

“…really?” Jigen glances at him, one eye exposed enough enough to show a questioning eyebrow lift as he puffs on his cigarette. 

“Ever since I was a child. _That_ was the start of _this._ ” He gestured at his own nose, indicating the _distinct_ unevenness. 

“Huh, always kinda thought that was on Lupin’s tab.” Jigen admits.

“Just the last one, it happened a few times. The damage had been done by then.” That was thing Zenigata had learned about him all on his own: get Lupin in a corner, and sometimes the outcome was a boxer class horseshoe-in-the-glove _haymaker_. 

Jigen grins at that- maybe it’d just been intuition, or kind of pride in his partner. But he’d always felt like the only guy who COULDA left a dent on Pops had to be Lupin. But even a baby ogre was bound to get hurt, he supposes. 

“Aw, don’t worry pops. Cuties like a face with a bit of character. Least I can’t figure why else they go for a mug like Lupin’s.” That actually got he other man. Jigen enjoys the sound of it- kind of a raspy, back of the throat ‘ _Gyeh-heh-heh!’_ with a mean edge a mile wide. 

He has to take a second to think. What would be interesting for Zenigata to know, but not really do his guy any harm? 

“Lupin’s a picky eater.” Jigen says- watching as Zenigata tilts his head, the brim of his hat skewing unevenly to accentuate his confusion. 

“I dunno if it’s a french thing or what, but he gets in a giant snit about greasy, cheap food. Between him and Goemon it’s honestly easier to settle for hot pot or something.” he elaborates with an annoyed, tired expression. On one hand it felt fair to say a little more. Zenigata’d been almost exhaustingly open with extra details. But really… Like hell he was giving up a chance to vent! 

“Is that right? Because I’m the one who has to pick through your hideouts _._ ” Zenigata couldn’t really talk, his own eating habits were… uneven. But when he turned up nothing but takeout boxes and cigarette butts you could start to get concerned. 

“Search me, Lupin claims instant noodle bowls ‘transcend cuisine’. And hey, that reminds me, did any of my magazines wind up in evidence? Because I wasn’t done reading one them.” Jigen asks, smiling in mean delight as Zenigata goes a nice shade of pink and angry.

“I’m not telling you that!” Zenigata snaps. Alright now leave it, he tells himself, _leave it_ , This was a trap, there was no way jigen wasn’t blatantly teasing him, say anything else and this was ending in infuriating sniggers 

“And how would I even know which magazines are _yours_ anyhow!” Zenigata add.

“Oh that’s easy, Pops. Goemon doesn’t buy stuff like that- he just pretends he’s not sneaking peeks at ours. An’ you can spot _Lupin’s_ cause he’s a chest guy.” He makes a casual cupping gesture in the air just under his own chest to demonstrate. 

Zenigata considers, as he has done many times before, that sometimes you could be right, and also not happy about it even slightly. Jigen, meanwhile, was sniggering.

The next round winds up about the same; Zenigata about manages to punch a hole through the single red leaf on a tree, and Jigen neatly shoots out the electric filament of a long busted streetlamp bulb that’s all the way down the street- without so much as grazing the rest of the structure. 

Jigen keeps his eyes on Zenigata, watching as he patted his pockets down looking for something. That glance under the hood of his trenchcoats had been pretty interesting. Extra interior pockets, and the cloth was thick with reinforced panels supporting all that storage.No wonder the guy was always slouching. With all the handcuffs and ropes he’s seen him pull out of that coat? 

Might as well he wearing lead weights. Sheesh. Hard working guys sure are exhausting. It’s as bad as Goemon’s nutty training. 

Zenigata finds what he was looking for in his pockets and pulls out a rectangular green metal tin, popping the lid off with a nail so he can shake out a few hard candies.

“I have kinda a sweet tooth.” It’s both his fact, and an explanation to Jigen's curious stare. He holds the tin out towards him, shrugging and capping it when Jigen waves the gesture off. 

“Never really had candy or much of anything sweet when I was a kid. Ah, outside of stuff like new years. Probably the first thing I rebelled against.” he adds, shaking out a few more pieces.

Jigen winches slightly as he hears a loud crunching sound- Zenigata was eating the candy it like it was goddamn popcorn. Maybe he’d use one of his questions to find out the hell was up with the mans _teeth_.

He shakes it off, mind vaguely searching around for another fact.

“Lupin can’t sing for shit.” He offers. 

“I knew THAT already. Its like psychological warfare being trapped in a squad car with him… at least once he’s done pouting.” Zenigata retorts. 

“Ch! Think that’s bad, try a road trip sometime. In that case… how bout that he knows ballet?” Jigen tries. 

“…Huh. I could see it.” Zenigata says, after a moment of reflection. He knew Lupin had to be trained in balance, after all… let alone some of the jumps he could make. That kind of thing could really make a mans hair turn white, especially knowing he’d have to try and follow.

“Just get him pink wine and put on somethin twinkly. He can even do that tippy toe thing.” Jigen gestures with two fingers downward, making a slight fluttering motion to indicate the dance.

“En pointe.” Zenigata supplies. 

“No, two points- he uses _both_ feet, Pops.”

The third round of traded shots sees Zenigata cursing in frustration; the bottle cap hidden half under a fallen leaf he’d called Jigen on? Punched clean through the center. But the window Jigen’d given as a target out was barely more then a hands width, and far outside of his range. What could he do? Asking to move closer was out of the question, it was as good as asking for a handicap. And as a result, his bullet had lodged right outside the edge. 

He doesn’t even want to _look_ at Jigen; this time when he hunts through his pocket his pack of smokes comes out again, his next exhale as dark with smoke as his mood was. He can’t prove anything but if there’s one thing he knows, it’s that he can sense a dirty trick is in the air.

“You should really vary your shot training, pops. Easy to get your hands in a habit.” Jigen offers, holstering his magnum and not feeling remotely bad in the least. There was no reason to rely on luck to play the cards when you can rely on playing your _opponent_ instead. And this was a proper double or nothing bet. 

“Hmph.” there was a dangerous glint in Zenigata’s eyes as he gives Jigen a long look. Well, if there was any answers to be found he wouldn’t find them in Jigen’s smug grin. He follows suit and holsters his gun as well, scowling. 

“I make my own cuffs.” he crosses his arms tightly over his chest- raising an eyebrow as Jigen waves a finger at him, giving a firm head shake. 

“Try again pops. I know that one.” he says. 

“You do?” Zenigata blinks, surprised. 

“Sure. Tell you what, be a good Pops and quit pouting and I’ll tell you how when you land your next shot.” Jigen offers. 

“I wasn’t pouting!” Zenigata does perk up a little bit at that- so it had to do with Lupin? …Well, wait, of course it did. Lupin was a mechanical genius. Zenigata had yet to put together a lock the man couldn’t bust inside a minute. He could just imagine Lupin laughing at his attempts to even try. 

“Alright, fine then. I’ve taken dance classes too- _not_ ballet. Mostly ballroom- I’ve always been uncoordinated. My mentor, Detective Hanshichi’s thought it might help back when I was in training.” Zenigata walks over to where his car’s parked while he’s speaking to sit on the hood, propping one leg up on the bumper. 

“I’d pay pretty good money to see you cut a rug, Pops.” Jigen follows after him, leaning with his back against the wall of one of the buildings Zenigata’s car was between. Abandoned town or not, he still likes a wall at his back. 

“Consider my dance card full.” Zenigata growls. 

“Aw, don’t say that. I’ll even let you lead.” Jigen offers- though privately, he’d probably want to slip on some steel toed boots first. Just in case. 

“Just ask your question.” 

“Suit yourself.” Jigen says, leaning his head back against the wall a moment to think. What to ask? There was plenty he could think of. But he supposes he might as well just cut to the quick of it. 

“Pops… who were you, before Lupin?” Jigen asked, pushing off from the wall and moving to stand in front of his car.He doesn’t like having an opening behind him, but it’s worth it to be able to watch his face. 

He’s close enough now, or downwind enough, that he can smell the mans cigarettes. Which was no small feat, considering how burnt out Jigen was on the smell of nearly any kind of smoke at all. But you could always pick out Pops’. He smoked unfiltered brands, with the strongest kicks to them you could get on a market; dark, sweet smelling things. It always struck him like burning sugar, or standing next to a furnace.

“I mean, besides a cop.“ he adds.

Zenigata looked up at him, having to consider the question. He’d been expecting this to be when he could figure out Jigen’s angle. There had to be something he’s getting out of a deal like this. But it seemed like an honestly personal question.For the first time, he lets himself consider that maybe Jigen really was just… curious about him. Maybe this was still going to be when some unseen snare pulls tight, but. 

Despite himself his guard lowers a bit. It’s not that often someone just wants to know about _him_ , after all.

“I was in training for a year at the academy, but before that I worked as a bouncer for a cabaret club.” he crosses one leg over the other, reminiscing a little. It’d been a while since he’d thought about those days. 

“Detective Hanshichi actually helped me get that job. It was good work- I took a lot of pride in keeping the girls who worked there safe.”

Jigen narrows his eyes at him, watching the other man get all far-away eyed. He’d half been expecting to just hear he’d been in college or something before being a cop. It was pretty easy to imagine the guy as a clean faced student. …Okay it was also pretty easy to imagine him as a young bouncer, too, but. 

“You knew ‘ol Pops The First _before_ you were a cop?” he asks, keeping his tone as casual as he possibly can. 

Zenigata grins brightly, the mention of his mentor cheering him. No matter what, he’d always be proud of having been taught by a man like him. Whenever his pursuit of Lupin happened to take him to Hawaii he liked to drop in on him… and… not really ask a lot of questions about just how he’d managed his very sudden, very funded retirement. 

“Oh, sure! I met him years before I finally made it onto the force! Good thing too, I never would have gotten steady work without his help. Hell, it was probably him speaking on my behalf that finally got me accepted into the academy.” Zenigata explains. 

Jigen listens, feeling like he was watching a hand of cards come together. Pops had always been in the habit of explaining himself juuust a little too much- now he wonders if he isn’t secretly a chatty guy when he’s relaxed. 

“Sounds like you two are real close.” he says, idly stoking the fires of Zenigata’s cheerful chattering. 

“Of course!” Zenigata boasts, practically shining with enthusiasm. Hanshichi was like a father to him. His legacy was something Zenigata strives to try and carry on, despite his own flaws.

“Must be kinda awkward then, first meeting a guy like that in a squad car.” Jigen says casually- about the same tone as he’d said anything else. It was a bit of a shot in the dark, but with as good as a lit up window. 

“Heh! Maybe a little. Though, come to think of it, he only introduced himself in the interrogation room.” Zenigata laughed a little, still cheerful and relaxed for a beat. Then all at once his eyes widened, realization slamming home. 

“…Ah! E-eh, I mean…” he tries weakly to cover, cringing back a little as Jigen leaned down, fixing him with a stare as intense as a sniper’s sights. A smile was curling on Jigen’s lips, that did nothing to reassure Zenigata at all.

“Why, Pops. You tellin’ me our favorite lawman has _a criminal record_?” a menthol smoke purr slipped around Zenigata and pulled tight, snaring him in place. He tries to lean back away to get space enough to think or recover at all, but it’s no good.   
  
“I… I mean. Some…?” he says nervously, twiddling his fingers together and swallowing, trying to rally some last defensive maneuver.

“All you asked is who I was _before being a cop_! And theres your answer. A young idiot lucky enough to have a good man helping ME become a productive member of society!” he says, leaning back up and trying to be firm. That had to work with a member of Lupin’s gang EVENTUALLY, right? 

“Oh, real lucky. After all, people sure hesitate to hire an _ex con_ , huh?” Jigen responds, fixing him with an intent stare. Honestly, whatever else Jigen manages to get out of the man from their little shootout- to him just then, It was already all worth it just for this.

“I d-didn’t say anything about being a _convict,_ damnit!” It’s no use- Zenigata’s little burst of resolve has completely evaporated. He’s leaning back as far as he can now, weighing the pros and cons of actually trying to scramble back over the car roof.

“No, you didn’t. You did pretty good. An honest person wouldn’t have been looking for little cracks in a sweet story like that.” Jigen keeps leaning in just a little more, forcing Zenigata back inch by inch. Soon there was no room left for Zenigata to flee to, his shoulders bumping up against the cold glass of his car’s windshield.

“Pity you’re talking to me instead, eh?” Jigen says, his smile sharpening into a grin as he taps his cigarette off to the side. Zenigata tries to duck down under his hat as some last escape, but Jigen simply snatches it off his head. He’s not letting him run now.

Zenigata still keeps his head ducked down. He can only bring himself to glance at Jigen- flustered by how _intently_ Jigen was staring at him. With his head turned to the side to try and escape it, he hears Jigen move more then he sees it. jJust the slightest rustle of cloth, and the gentle sound of his hat dropping to the car hood next to him.

And then, Jigens’ hand was a slight weight settling against his hair, just above his ear. It settles there a moment before moving, stroking slowly up to his temple. Just the base of his palm was touching his bare skin, making s soft path of warmth, mingling with the sensation of rough skin gliding over his hair.

“Easy now.” Jigen murmurs, his grin still pretty wicked even as he strokes his hand just slightly back and forth, mussing up that neat little flat top of his. Zenigata’s starting to look back at him now- and lord, but he’s got a _soft_ look to him. Soft as the thick black hair under his hand, with an uncertain little frown and hopeful eyes.

“Just a little more, Pops. You can’t just leave me with a taste like that.” Jigen reaches out with the hand not busy petting the man, neatly plucking Zenigata’s cigarette up between two fingers. He spits his own to the side, and idly combs his fingers back through his hair. 

“I know you don’t take _bribes._ But you’d be okay with a man expressing his _gratitude_ , right, Zenigata?” he asks, raising the other man’s stolen cigarette up to his own lips a moment to steal a lingering little puff. 

“…it… was about year and a half. I got off lightly because I was young.” Zenigata mutters, turning his head back to face him. Jigen gives a rumbling _hum_ of approval Zenigata feels as much as he hears, sinking into his bones.

“There, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” Jigen says, before he moves to close what little gap was left between them. The shadow of his hat for a moment hiding both of them from view as Jigen’s lips firmly press against Zenigatas.

There was just the slightest little press back _up_ against the kiss after a second. Almost shy, as Zenigata tilts his head a little into the kiss. Jigens shifts to slip underneath Zenigata’s head, supporting him for a warm, drifting minute. 

Jigen pulls back only in slow little motions, breaking the kiss. It’s just too _sweet_. It’s sweet as the heady smoke from his dark little cigarettes, or the tin of candy the inspector had downed like popcorn. The kiss, that was. But also that Pops, savage, feral, honorable man of conviction Pops had done more actual jail time then _Lupin’s whole gang put together_. 

It’s so good he has to forcefully remind himself to back off a little. They still had a game to finish. …No matter how much fun he could have grabbing Zenigata by the tie and getting the rest of the story out of him by asking real nice _._ He’d made up his mind to feel the guy out, not feel him up. Gotta be patient. 

This was no time to start rushing his shots. Jigen straightens back up, sets Zenigata’s cigarette back in his mouth, and steps a bit away to give Zenigata some room. He pulls a fresh cigarette out while he waits for Pops to recover.

Zenigata takes a few seconds- he has the sudden, vague feeling he might know what a rabbit staring down a _wolf_ felt like now. But with some effort he sits up, feeling his heart hammering somewhere near his throat and trying to pretend the reason he was suddenly far too hot for his coats was just from the early afternoon sun. …in an abandoned town, almost completely under tree shade. 

Zenigata is a thinker. Not necessarily the smartest man in the room, but he can set his mind to task and let it run as long as he needs it to. And after a long career of putting that into practice, it’d become habit. Now, part of him was always just a little to the side of the rest of him on the inside. It’s the part of him thats filing things away, waiting for the right combination of facts to hand back a result, or sound an alarm. It’s what he relies on.

And it’d all shorted out about one second before Jigen’s hand has touched his hair, leaving him with about all of one useful thought.

He was in over his head. And Zenigata knows himself to be a man who was far too likely to dive in deeper then he was to find the surface.

“Need a hand up there, pops…?” Jigen holds out a hand, a little surprised when it’s actually taken- hesitantly, while not really looking at him, but still. He braces his feet against the ground as Zenigata pulls up to his feet- he wasn’t really heavier then some of the stuff him and Lupin had hauled in their time but still, sheesh.

“…That nickname again. How old do you think I _am_ anyway?” Zenigata asks, letting go of his hand to tug his trench coat off, setting it down on his car hood with a somewhat noticeable _thunk._ He grabs his hat and takes a second to roll his shoulders. 

“You don’t want me to answer that. Why spoil a nice time?” Jigen smirks, idly reaching out to grab the trench coat, testing the weight with an experimental pull, letting it drop to listen to the sound. 

“Don’t touch the pockets.” Zenigata warns as he puts his hat back on, adjusting it carefully. Behind him, Jigen immediately smirks, and flexes his hand experimentally before leaning over the jacket. 

“Pockets? Why would I be doing a thing like that- I’m offended you’d think such a thing of me, after all these years…” Jigen says with an air of absolute affront, just before there was a soft metal _snap._

Zenigata turns around.

“So… you got keys for these?” Jigen asks, deadpan as he holds up his handcuffed wrist, light glinting off the chain now anchoring him to the coat. 

“Maybe. What’s the magic word?” Zenigata asks, closing his eyes a second as his shoulders shake with vindictive amusement.

“Abracadabra. Now get the key, chuckles.” Jigen sighs as that sets off a fresh wave of barely restrained snickering, and waits. Experimentally he tugs on where the chain is connected to the jacket… hissing slightly when whatever it’s attached to has the tense faint give of something like a grenade’s pin. He lowers his hand cautiously eying the trench coat a little more warily now.

Zenigata relents now he’s recovered, turning around briefly so Jigen wouldn’t see where he pulls his keys from. When he turns back towards Jigen he’s sorting through a ring of at least a dozen nearly identical keys, selecting the correct one. Jigen sticks his arm out for him as much as he can without actually pulling on the chain, watching as Zenigata holds the cuff steady in one hand. A turn of the key and a yank up on it like a lever pop the cuff off neatly. 

“You gotta know Lupin probably wouldn’t get held up by a trick like that, right?” Jigen asks, rubbing his wrist a little. Exactly where his ring of keys had gone Jigen wasn’t sure. Shame, coulda been useful. Though… come to think of it, had he ever seen him need to actually unlock one of those? Between Lupin’s hands and Goemon’s sword, It has to just be some weird mark of honor that he even still made em with keyholes.

“Never say never. Even if it takes him five seconds to get out of something, those seconds could be all I need.” Zenigata chuckles darkly as he reset’s the cuffs and wind it back into a hidden slit in the pockets material. He pauses to admire his own work just a moment before setting his coat aside, and starting to walk back out into the street.

“Besides since when is he the only criminal I chase?” Zenigata adds, glancing back at Jigen just a little as he comes to a stop in the street. 

“…What, really? And here I thought you were a one-man guy.” Jigen follows him, curiosity rising at the same time as his paranoia clicked into gear. There’s no way he took on a second case for no reason. Maybe someone was targeting him? Or maybe the ICPO was doing something squirrely again. Shit, he might have to blow a question on this if Zenigata refuses to say more.Or Lupin could figure it out, but. 

He’d better be sure first. He’s not sure how Lupin would even take news like that. Best case, he’d be petulant and go to figure it out. Worst case he’d laugh it off, and smile that one way that can give even a hired killer goosebumps. 

…when did Zenigata even have the TIME to be chasing anyone but Lupin? Just thinking about Pops’ schedule was enough to make him want to take a nap on his behalf.

“Let me be clear then.” Zenigata says as he stops stops, turning to face him and interrupting Jigen’s flurry of thoughts. He was standing under the shadows of a tree, his expression half hidden under the uneven little sweeps of light, maybe 10 feet from Jigen.

“My quarry hasn’t been _one_ man since the first day I stood under your gun’s sights, Daisuke Jigen.” Zenigata says, with a voice and tone like metal heated to a blue shine. 

Jigen finds himself staring.The only light over Zenigata face was the faint red glow of his cigarette, and the shine of his eyes, but he could swear for a second he sees something there. Something soft under sharp. Or maybe the other way around.

Of all the times for Lupin to suddenly come to mind… maybe it was only appropriate. When had it been? Sometime before the whole incident with the old coins and that computer maze. He knew it was, because he’d said something like-

_”I mean he’s fun, don’t get me wrong boss, but he’s a joke.” And there’d been that rolling, high little laugh of his._

_“Hyuhuhu! Fun trouble, maybe~ With a guy like him, you could die laughing.”_

_“Be serious.”_

_“The great Lupin the Third is always serious! …Besides the thing about Pop is sometimes… juuust sometimes… he can be really cool.”_

_“I’ll believe it when I see it.”_

_“Be careful when you do, eh Jigen~?” There’d been arms slipping around his waist, and a warm weight against his shoulders . Lupin was one of the only men in the world Jigen could ever trust at his back, and he took full advantage of it._

_“He could arrest your breath away.” Lupin’s voice was a teasing little birdsong, his lips finding their way to the crook of Jigen’s neck as he pressed against his back._

_“I think your jokes lose something in translation.” And that’d been that. Or at least, there sure hadn’t much more conversation._

“Are we finishing the match or not?” Zenigata asks.

“…Wouldn’t miss it for anything.” Jigen replies, shaking himself a little out of the recollection. He takes one more appreciative glance before the wind changed, and he shadows of the branches overhead slipped away from the other man. 

And not for the first time, he finds himself thinking… god damn, but what a waste oftalent. 


	3. Shot 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In a continuing trend, Zenigata can't catch a break while Jigen is a massive damn brat. On one hand I swear the drink part will happen eventually, but also hey, anyone in for the first 10k of romantic tension and conversation is probably in for the next... checks drafts... 5-7k ish.

Zenigata throws himself into looking for targets- he needs something to distract himself from Jigen. Which was, like a lot of things in his life, easier said then done. Especially now with heat still lingering on his lips and his heart thundering. Even as his eyes stay fixed on trying to scour for a target… it’s the same as ever. It’s hard not to look at them. It’s harder to convince himself he only pays attention because it’s his job. 

He still remembers the day he first watched a patch of shadow step out from behind Lupin and look at _him_ like he was something _dangerous_. Not a joke. 

Jigen always makes him think a bit of the stories he used to read when he was in jail. Hanshichi would come and visit him, and always bring a few books. Cheap, worn out paperback kind of things. Mysteries, thrillers, historical drama, honor and blood kind of things. It wasn’t exactly high literature. But for him, then, a dumb broken hearted kid who never had been much of a reader… that was classic literature.

He always liked the one type. The rough voiced men with broken hearts of silver. A little too scuffed to shine, a little too worn down to let themselves care. The ones who’d call the hero a fool for loving someone, just to turn around and put themselves between him and the world. 

Unbearably cool. Especially to a dumb kid who wore his heart on his sleeve and cared what people thought of him so much that even now it hurt like an old scar.

It’d just disappointed him when he’d read to the end, and somehow nobody seemed to realize what they had. Well. He’d been a romantic kid, with a broken heart and a weakness for men with dangerous eyes. Then he’d grown up, and thought he’d put those kinds of ideas behind him.

But there Jigen was… and there Lupin was. Lupin, who was fool enough to fall in love again and again. Lupin, who never seemed to hesitate in the least to reach out for happiness. Who plays life like a game and smiles the whole time. Who’s never alone unless he wants to be. Someone worth being a fool over

If Lupin was the hero, then he was all the dumb broken hearted kid in a jail cell could ever have have dreamed of.

Damn it all. Why did these people have to make it all seem so _easy_? 

“Hey, Pops! Ready for your first mark?” Jigen calls out, interrupting his thoughts. 

Zenigata shakes himself. He was supposed to be a professional, not some rookie letting himself get wound up! …well maybe it’s a little late in his career to get worried about being ‘wound up’, but. Still.

“Course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?” he snaps back gruffly, shoving his hands deep in his pockets and trying to shove any damn thoughtful recollections right the hell back where they came from.

“Good. 9 o clock. Think fast.” 

Zenigata turns quickly- and stops, as he realizes the motions turned him straight back to face Jigen. The hell’s he up to…? But he doesn’t get long to think about it. Jigen immediately shifts- catching a fallen tree branch under his foot and, with one high _kick_ , sends it straight at the other man as hard as he can. 

He barely has enough time to be surprised. _That was going to hurt if it hits, and if it’s his target then- but the wood can’t be hard enough to take the full force of a bullet- Jigen was RIGHT behind it- he can’t_

But the thoughts don’t matter, because he’s already moving. His guns in his hands as he dives to the side, forcibly turning away from Jigen to keep him out of his sights. There’s no time to aim, no time to finish the thought. Theres just enough time for the sound of gunfire cracks through the air as he takes the only shot he might get, squeezing the trigger almost completely blind from the hip. 

The branch is punched out of the air in an explosion of splintering wood. Almost before it hits the cobblestones, Zenigata rounds on Jigen, eyes flaring as he stalks up to him, shoving his gun back in it’s holster like a 17 year old hanging up on an ex. There’s barely an inch left of his cigarette, and at the rate he’s now angrily puffing on it he might risk singing his lips. He spits it out instead, grinding it under his heel as he glares at Jigen.

“What the fucking god damn HELL do you call _THAT?_ ” he hisses through bared teeth, glaring down at him. Without breaking furious eye contact he drags out his cigarette carton and yanks a dark colored smoke out with his teeth inelegantly. Usually he tries to curb his smoking, if for no other reason then his salary didn’t really stretch to many vices. But he was going to have god damn _stroke_ unless he chain smokes almost as badly as this idiot, overconfident, smug _son of a bitch_ gunman does. 

The son of a bitch in question regards him, lips curling into a catlike, smug smile. He moves with the least amount of urgency or concern possible, idly patting himself down before a hand vanishes into a pocket. It comes back out holding a lighter, which he flicks on to hold up to Zenigata’s unlit cigarette. 

“I call it a damn good shot.” he replies, evenly looking up into the other mans face as he lets the fire catch. It really had been. And he’d been in exactly the right place to watch the show- front row and center. No better way to find out how a man shoots then to be standing in front of him- anything else is confident guesswork, in his book. 

“Wh- you- I could have _HIT_ you, you goddamned stooge! _”_ Zenigata retorts, nearly _resenting_ feeling his nerves start to settle as he took a deep breath. What he definitely does resent is that as simple a gesture as giving him a _light_ was softening the edge of his anger. He isn’t some over-eager pup looking for a pat on the HEAD, damnit! Or at least that’s what he tries to tell himself.

“Ehhhh.” Jigen makes a vague sound and shrugs one shoulder up, pocketing his lighter.

“You didn’t, though.” Jigen adds, as if sensing that maybe, just maybe, all this furious glaring meant that Pops needs just a bit more then ‘literally not a fucking answer’.He uses the same relaxed confidence he’d used to light the smoke to reach up, and brush a few bits of splintered wood off Zenigata’s shoulders. He wasn’t even sure the other man had even noticed they were there. All that laserlike attention, and the guy never seems to turn any of it on himself.

Zenigata tries to bat his hand away, doing a bad job of not letting confusion shine through his glare and scowl. He doesn’t have an answer to that. He doesn’t seem have an answer to anything Jigen was doing. It feels like he keeps losing his balance- no. He keeps being _taken_ off balance, pushed one way and pulled another over and over in little tugs and lurches. He’s not used to that. He’s _used_ to a firehose pressure blast he can at least dig his damn feet into the ground against. 

He’s used to assuming the worst, and doing his best not to be charmed. Even if it doesn’t work, at least he knows what the rules are. But this? Zenigata can’t even tell if he’s being toyed with, or tested. And the worst part is, he’s not sure he even dislikes either option all that much. He just wants to know where he stands. 

Hah. As if he ever knows where he stands with these people.

Jigen neatly dodges Zenigata’s half-hearted attempts to swat him off and reaches up again and brushes away a splinter of wood from the mans cheek. When Zenigata’s gaze flick down, he almost wishes he hadn’t. That lazy grin seems to have floated away on the smoke, leaving calm eyes draped in shadow like the black of a bandit mask. 

“I wouldn’t _let_ you shoot me, Pops. Promise.” Jigen says firmly. It’s what he’d rather hear, if it was him. Not ‘You’d never shoot me’. He wouldn’t say a thing like that- not to Pops. He likes him too much for that. 

’Never’ is a fools lie. Almost as bad as the honey sweet poison of ‘forever’. Things change, and life doesn’t give a damn about promises- For all he knows, maybe one day Pops would have a damn good reason to gun him down. The least he owes him is one less weight on his shoulders about it.

A guy could do a whole lot worse then getting taken down by a man ruthless enough he’d never hesitate, but good enough he’d probly cry about it.

“Now, you got a shot for me?” He asks, tugging Zenigata’s hat down over his face. It was Jigens turn to slip away to the side, burying his hands in his pockets.How annoying. Even without Lupin here he can just hear the man tease him for being a romantic. 

“Eh? Ah… R-right.” Zenigata clears his throat, filing away whatever THAT had been for. Later. Probably. There was a lot happening here he feels he needs five free hours and a bottle of whiskey to figure out. Luckily he has long practice shoving back being flustered as hell long enough to figure out a plan

“If you’re allowed to kick something at me, then how about a thrown target?” Zenigata asks, slowly putting together an idea.

“Sure. Never set a rule against it. You got something in mind?” Jigen glances up- surprised when he’s met by a familiar monkey grin- or at least a very familiar drawing of it. Zenigata was holding one of Lupin’s calling cards up, smirking with that little flicker of cunning he gets sometimes. Half the time right it right before he gets properly suckered, but its still a pretty good look

“Aw, Pops. You keep those? How many you got by now? Gotta be over a hundred.” Jigen grins at him as he examines the card, tickled by the thought. Pops really was a sentimental guy.

“Don’t get smart with me. They’re _evidence_ , of course I keep them. This one just happens to be useless.” Zenigata growls, turning away from him. He turns the card over in his hand, feeling the weight of it a second, flipping it up an inch into the air- watching with intent focus as the card loops in the air and lands back in his palm. 

“You take that back. I’ve never been smart in my life.” Jigen retorts, in a deadpan that has a snicker hiding in it. He looks to Pops to see if he has a comeback to that, but to his surprise, it doesn’t seem to be coming. Instead, Zenigata’s staring intently out at the landscape around them, his gaze darting through the air tracing out along invisible paths, watching the wind.

Jigen takes a step away to give him room, keeping his eyes fixed sidelong at the man still. He can’t help but enjoy it, watching allll that mean, wicked focus winding up tight just to try and get little ol’ him to miss a stitch. After seein’ that… what can a man do, besides his best? 

It makes him want to _strut_ a little. Most times, he wasn’t too big on being in a spotlight by himself. It was only fun with Lupin. A lot of stuff’s fun with Lupin. _Trouble_ for instance. Lupin loves trouble, and near as Jigen can ever tell, trouble loves him right back. So Jigen wouldn’t have figured it’d be much fun without him. But… 

He cracks a wide, sharp grin. Things will always be more fun with Lupin. But he could get used to having this particular spotlight all to himself a couple of minutes. 

Black, subtly heeled shoes settle into the moss and weed covered cobblestones as Jigen sets his stance, disturbing a puff of dandelions enough to send a flurry of seeds rolling away in the wind. The motion of holding his right arm out at his side feels as natural as the click of a firing hammer. Sure, he could just have his gun up at the ready. They weren’t working on duel rules or nothing. He just feels like it. 

Zenigata readies his arm in an iron curve, holding the card at his left shoulder. A second ticks by as he clears his head and watches the path he needs light up under his fingertips. It’s just long enough before he’s whipping his arm in a fluid roll of force from shoulder to wrist, twisting his hand to shift the angle and send the card up in a soaring arc that hooks right, and catches the wind to fuel a sudden uneven spin.

But Zenigatas eyes aren’t _on_ the card by then. He’s turning as fast as he can to watch Jigen the instant it leaves his hand- and somehow, it’s still barely fast enough. He misses the start of the draw. Jigen’s hand is already full of silver, his arm moving in the liquid curl of a whip crack. 

Thunder blooms in the path of Jigen’s eyes. 

And just like that, when he turns back to look, he can already see the red card fluttering to the earth like a wounded bird. Zenigata sighs, head slumping forward and to the side, even his hat seeming to sag with his disappointment. But he can’t keep a smile from resting in his expression. If he has to lose, it might as well be beautiful. 

“Well, what the hell else did I expect.” he says, almost to himself. With a shrug, he starts to walk towards the slowly falling card, tracking its slow fluttering path.

“Ah, don’t pout, Pops. It was a hell of a throw. I didn’t know you could pull that trick with cards too.”Jigen cheerfully ambles after Zenigata. Theres a clean metallic click as Jigen pops his revolver’s cylinder open, reloading in a practiced flicker of motion. Friendly competition or not, he’d always rather stay topped up. 

Zenigata smirks, a little prideful on that point. He only has so many skills that are even a _little_ unique, after all. 

Following the cards path takes him into what must once have been someones garden; at least judging by the stone house foundations, those stone steps leading to the ghost of a house, and an ocean of riotously growing basil fighting it out with rebel plots of mint for real estate.

“Course. My cuffs are just balanced for throws.Tossing cards is an easy way to pass the time if I’m stuck bored somewhere.” he explains, stumbling a little as he walks through the overgrown yard.

“You talkin’ airports, or jail?” Jigen snickers as he stops next to Zenigata, twirling his magnum showily before holstering it, just for the smug fun of it. 

Zenigata shoots him a quick glare, for that. It’s exactly enough time for Jigen to snatch the falling card out of the air, just before it would have landed in Zenigata’s hand. When he looks back, the empty space confuses him just enough to look back up into the air. He catches on after a second, glaring at the gunman.

Jigen ignores it as as he examines his handiwork, mouth twisting in an annoyed frown at the ragged hole in the card. Sure, he’s nailed it clean through. It’s a great shot. But it’s not a _perfect_ shot. The _perfect_ shot would be nailing Lupin’s little signature doodle as a bullseye. 

He’d wanted to show off. See Pops light up with that burnt-edge awe of his. He likes the way he’s too honest not to react, even if he’s annoyed about it

He tugs the brim of his hat down a little firmly, annoyed. Maybe it really _was_ a good throw. 

“Alright, pops. I’ll tell you something good.” Jigen says, tucking the card into one of Zenigata’s pockets. He picks his way through the thick growth of herbs, making his way towards the stone steps.

“Lupin takes your cuffs apart.” he says, sitting down on the steps.

“Don’t exaggerate- he usually just pops the lock.” Zenigata growls back, pulling the card Jigen had shot back out of his pocket and examining it himself. Sheesh, clear through the middle…

“Eh?! No, for cryin’ out loud…” Jigen replies, rubbing the palm of his hand against his forehead a moment, trying to suss out if any of that had been a goddamn joke or not. The guy can be as bad as Goemon like that- Jigen had nearly gotten a migraine the day Goe had pointed at a waffle and asked what ‘that square doriyaki’ was. They both had to be fucking with him _some_ of these times, right?

“ _No_ , you ditzy flatfoot. I’m talking about why I knew you MAKE your cuffs. It’s cause Lupin takes. Them. A _part_.” he clarifies, lowering his hand and tugging his hat back into place, holding one hand out palm up, and miming turning something in his other hand, indicating someone using a tool.

“… _Oh_.” Zenigata catches on all at once- going pink and pulling his shoulder up around his ears bashfully. He tucks the card Jigen shot back into his pocket, and flicks a cuff out from inside his jacket in a practiced motion to look at it with wide eyed thoughtfulness a second.

Now that’s a reaction. From Jigens perspective the man might as well have be radiating steam. He leans back against the steps with his hands behind his head, making himself comfortable while he’s watching him.

“Practically has more fun with a new model of cuff then he does the treasure, some days.” he can’t help but add, just for the fun of watching that blush get worse. Really, he kinda feels bad sometimes for any other crooks Zenigata’s cuffs might get tossed at… him and Lupin’s little arms race produced some pretty scary locks. Even a so-so lock pick like him could tell THAT much. 

“Hmph. All THAT means is I need to make them good enough to CATCH him, not just entertain him.” Zenigata attempts to snap at him, but the best he can do is a slight grumble. His mouth is stuck in a soft wobble of a repressed smile as he starts to twirl his cuffs, fidgeting with them. He builds enough momentum to catch the chain against his hand, moving his hand in a shy little circle so that it kept spinning around one finger. 

“Oh…? So you _wouldn’t_ enjoy hearing he wrecked a pair of picks on one or two of those then, eh?” Jigen replies, shading his eyes to watch as Zenigata’s arm arches up and sends his cuffs high up in the air out of sight. Pops meanwhile just stands there and looks to Jigen, as if he’s forgotten what he was doing. Which… 50-50 odds, honestly.

“Of course not. Such pettiness is beneath a true officer of the law.” He snaps, holding his head up haughtily, his eyes closed and arms crossed tightly over his chest in the perfect picture of offended righteousness. At least until he peeks one eye open to look at Jigen, and tilts his head towards.

“But, eh, but… say out of _curiosities_ sake… you remember which ones?” he asks, poking his fingers together in one the worst attempt at nonchalance he's ever seen. And he’s caught Goemon trying to steal one of his magazines before. 

“Even _if_ I remembered, you really think I’d rat that much out?” Jigen replies, shaking his head at him reproachfully. 

“Had to try.” Zenigata grins, shrugs, and holds his right arm out at his side, JUST before the cuffs come sailing back down, anchoring around his arm with a snap. Zenigata grins, and holds his arm up to examine the cuff, flicking it with a fingernail to check the lock was set.

There’s a soft clapping sound- and despite them being the only two people in the whole town, Zenigata finds himself almost surprised that it’s coming from jigen. A genuine sound- he could guess it was anyhow, because he’d seen it before. Just usually it wasn’t directed at him, and usually the reason he heard it was because the car he riding was in had just been cut in half. 

He snorts and gives a little half bow, a soft glow of pride warming his chest. It really was probably embarrassing letting himself be pleased about the praise of a criminal. But sometimes… well who else in the damn world was qualified to judge?

Zenigata thinks a second, walking through the thick mint to sit on the stone steps next to Jigen. He flicks his ring of keys back out again, settling in. 

“You know about my ancestor, right?” he asks, setting about unlocking the cuff from his arm.

“Of course I do. Cmon, how long have we been dealing with you?” Well, to be specific Jigen knew once he’d asked Goemon about it. The story… hadn’t really been what he expected. Lupin and Goemon had that whole kind of grand ancestry thing going. But the way Goemon had put it… 

_It’d been one of those random waiting days, where whatever the plan was it involved him freezing his tuckus off sitting behind some stone wall waiting for a signal. He didn’t mind those so much with Goemon around, though. Especially when Goemon sat just a little closer then he needed to, pressing his shoulder to Jigens in an unspoken little pool of shared warmth. Not, of course, that a true warrior was bothered by the cold, he was sure._

_Goemon had held Zantetsuken on his lap that day. He’d taken note of it at the time, and the way his hand lingered now and then over the smooth wood, because he knew damn well Goemon didn’t need to have his hand on the damn sword to draw it faster then you can blink. It’s a part of him. Jigen was pretty sure sometimes if he set his hand to the steel, he could have felt Goemon’s pulse._

_Which meant if he was keeping it closer then he would normally… he was worrying. And in Jigens experience, giving him something to talk about helped a little. And you did have to give him a little nudge. Something historical and deeply Japanese, with a lineage? As safe a bet as putting money on every number at a roulette table. It didn’t hurt he’d been genuinely curious._

_“Zenigata Heiji. A thief taker.” Goemon had said, almost little more then a glint in his eye and the tone of his voice giving away how excited he was. The rest of him still had that ambient… predator in wait thing. It was a quality that reassured Jigen; only natural, really. He was a predator too._

_“…right, so. A cop. But old timey?” he was sure he’d said something to that effect, cause. Goemon had actually slipped and snorted at that. He shook his head- the motion sending his hair brushing against Jigens shoulder._

_“No. Police were of samurai class. A Thief Taker was traditionally working class… or had once been criminals themselves.” Goemon explained._

_He’d thought about it a bit and nudged Goemon in the side slightly, giving him a sly look._

_“So… you kinda outrank Pops, huh?” he’d asked. He might not know the nitty gritty of the old school Japan thing, but honestly aside from that all the broad strokes were pretty much what Jigen had grown up with. You had your big bosses, the middlemen, the fighters… and everybody else. And the people who mattered had the real good weapons._

_Probably a good thing he DID get it, going from a strict criminal structure to Lupin’s style was a hell of a culture shock for people used to assuming friendliness had a razor stuck in it somewhere…_

_“Perhaps.” was all Goemon had said, but he’d radiated smugness in a way that told Jigen he meant ‘yes’._

_“You telling me you could have been giving him his orders in another life, huh…? I’d like to see that.” a a firm jab to the ribs with a sword sheath jab didn’t do much to interrupt Jigens wheezing snicker._

_“Do not be crude.” Goemon had a way of going silently angry when he was flustered that was probably pretty dangerous to find so cute on such a deadly guy._

_“Who was being crude? You just got a dirty imagination, Goe.”_

_He wasn’t sure if it was enthusiasm for the subject, some kind of scolding, or maybe just a way for the pink-faced samurai to forcibly change the subject, but he did actually wind up learning a pretty good deal about Zenigata’s ancestor. Also the particulars of edo era coinage, surname laws, and that it was a ‘Jitte’, not a ‘fancy Japanese opera police baton thing’._

_Still. Pretty nice way to spend the time._

“He was an a thief taker… kinda an investigator, like you. He threw those coins from back when getting change back for one yen was still a thing?” Jigen says, back in the present, miming the action of throwing a small object. 

“Right!” Zenigata confirms with a grin. He’s pleasantly surprised by that; it cut off a lot of explaining. One of the nastier shocks he’d gotten when he moved to the ICPO wasn’t that his ancestor wasn’t well known. Even in japan, the name Zenigata mostly carried weight with other cops, or around the Tokyo area. The shock had been just how much _explaining_ his ancestors story took. Him not understanding new things in new places, he could handle. 

Finding out things he’d always taken for granted were almost so hard to explain it was barely worth trying…? That was what could get pretty lonely.

“So he’s why you’re a cop, and use a Jitte and all.” Jigen adds, wanting to show off a little. 

“ _Wrong_.” Zenigata grins wider at Jigens double take of confusion.

“Don’t misunderstand. The legacy of my ancestor is something I’m determined to honor. And training to fulfill that legacy is the reason _why_ I can pull a lot of the tricks I do. But he never used these.” he explains, dropping his cuffs back in his coat pocket, smiling fondly. 

“He didn’t dress like _this_ either… not that uh, he could?” he trails off, realizing about mid-way through that was a little bit… well it was the Edo period so western dress wasn’t a thing yet…  
  
“Or like I could pull off traditional wear.” Zenigata adds, glancing down at himself as he very nearly completely loses track of what hed been saying.

“Ooohhh I don’t know about that.” Jigen drawls- but this time Zenigata stubbornly keeps his gaze firmly away from him. It barely helps. He can sense the eyebrow waggling. 

“ _Shhh_.” he opts to hush him instead, trying to get his momentum back. 

“Just saying, you’ve got broad shoulders… get a lil more chest showing…” Jigen can’t help it; Pops gets so flustered so _fast_. Someone clever enough could really wrap a guy like that around their little finger… which is sort of what happened, he supposes.

“Wh- I wouldn’t be wearing one like GOEMON’S.” Zenigata snaps, reddening as his momentum immediately slams directly into a wall. 

“Aww. Why not?” Jigen asks, turning his head to look Zenigata over. Come to think of it, Goemon in a suit like Pops’ was always pretty easy on the eyes. 

“Because he wears his kimono like a damn punk, thats why. It’s _showy_. Almost as good as a silk jacket with ‘Strongest Under Heaven’ embroidered on the back.” Zenigata explains, gesturing at his own chest to indicate the way Goemon’s kimono was open in the front. 

“Silk jacket? Pretttttty specific example there.” Jigen says meaningfully, grinning and leaning in a little closer.

Zenigata colors darker, cursing himself. Dealing with the gunman in a conversation, he’s learning, is _tricky_. He has a fast eye for loose threads, and a way of tugging on them that could unravel a man. He just hopes to hell that Lupin got this kind of treatment about HIS stupid older outfits; he’d heard from Hanshichi allll about how Lupin used to dress.

“I didn’t wear a goddamn jacket that said that! I didn’t even wear my coat that often.” he snaps, glancing over.

Zenigata has to take a moment to consider something. How high were his odds Jigen’d use his next question to find out what kind of clothes he wore as an embarrassing 19 year old? And from there, how likely was it he’d wind up telling him more then he’d mean to about it…? It adds up fast to a gamble he can’t take. Time for a sacrifice ploy. Jigen couldn’t possibly want to spend a question on information he already had…   
  
He holds a finger up, looking away.

“You get ONE.” he grumbles. Jigen raises an eyebrow and settles in to wait, watching as Zenigata goes from annoyance, to deep thought, to a kind of heavy, weighty embarrassment. It takes him a few minutes, but Zenigata finally manages to square up his resolve. God help him…

“…Tiger print shirt. …worn a little LIKE goemon, come to think of it.” he finally says, letting out a deep sigh. He stands up, quickly. Jigen on the other hand is rooted to his seat, staring at him with the sparkling glee of a kid on Christmas god damn morning. 

“ _You_ ** _didn’t_** _._ ” Jigen is pretty sure he’d dropped his cigarette and he barely even cares. Oh god he hoped there were photos. Somewhere, somehow- there HAS to be. He’d said he was arrested, right? Did Japan DO mugshots back then? God damn absolutely _fuck_ whatever heist they had lined up next, they have an _urgent_ date with some goddamn police records in _Saitama_. 

“Nope. No more words. That was your fact. Words are over. _Shooting now_.” he growls, sheer embarrassment wearing his vocabulary down at unusual speed, not even glancing back at him as he stalked towards the street- slouched so far down he was practically bent in half. 

Jigen plants his hands on the step behind him, springing up to his feet to quickly trot after him. He grabs Zenigatas arm, going on one toe to let the momentum swing him around in front of the other man. 

“Eaaasy there, Tiger” he snickers as Zenigata rounds on him, and hops up- planting his hands firmly on his shoulders. Just as Pops started to swipe for a grab he leapfrogs directly over the man, snickering as he lands on his feet, stumbling the momentum out a moment.

Zenigata exhales and forces himself up out of the grab, opening and closing his hands a moment.

“Alright, alright. Back to business. On your 8.” Jigen says, idly walking around Zenigata. 

Zenigata exhales and stands up- slowly forcing the bolt of anger down to focus on the task. At least if he’s shooting, he’d just embarrass himself the _normal_ ways. 


End file.
